


Are You High Enough?

by k4ndieboi



Category: Non-Fandom - Fandom
Genre: Abuse, Angst, Cigarettes, Drugs, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Enemies to Lovers, Found Family, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, M/M, References to Depression, References to Drugs, Suicide Attempt, mlm, psychedelics
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-03-03
Updated: 2020-03-25
Packaged: 2021-02-28 00:28:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 6
Words: 19,115
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22994731
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/k4ndieboi/pseuds/k4ndieboi
Summary: Ty Ellis is a 17 year old high schooler who's been dealt kinda a shitty hand in life. His mom died when he was 14, his dad drinks all day, and no one at school likes him. All he has is his 3 friends and a drug problem. His friends, Jason, Quentin, and Seth have to find a way to pull him out of this hole before the hole swallows him.
Comments: 1
Kudos: 2





	1. I'm Made of Wax, Larry. What are you made of?

Everyone's addicted to something. Some people are addicted to sex, others are addicted to the internet. Most people are addicted to caffeine. Addictions are treated so casually, unless it's hard drugs or alcohol. But addictions are something everyone deals with, which is why it's concerning that no one talks about all the other kinds of addictions. For me, I'm addicted to nicotine. Some people say I have a drug problem, but I don't think I do. I can quit whenever I want, I just do drugs sometimes with my friends for fun. 

///

I woke up to the sound of my shitty alarm playing Neck Deep's newest song "In Bloom," in my shitty, grungy, small ass room. I groaned and turned the song off and checked my Snapchat. There were no messages just like always. I sat up and looked around my room for my earbuds, finding them on the floor next to my bed, where they pretty much always are. I grabbed my earbuds and my backpack next to them and headed downstairs and hoped my dad wasn't awake. I had no inclination to talk to him, ever.

I found him drunk, sleeping on the couch. Saying a silent prayer to whoever the fuck cares, I passed him and headed into the kitchen to make myself a cup of coffee. I didn't bother to change my clothes. I was wearing my A Day To Remember shirt and it had the Homesick album cover on it. It was the best album they've ever came out with if you ask me. I had some grey jeans on and I threw on my black chucks as my coffee had finished brewing. I poured the coffee into one of my travel mugs and didn't fucking bother with the creamer because I just didn't have time. My dad stirred on the couch behind me as I tried to walk out the door and I hoped he wouldn't wake up. But alas, he did, and sat up and looked at me. I groaned and turned around to face him.

"Tyler, did you really think you could just leave?" He said, still groggy from all the booze.

"No," I sighed. You'd think that since I'm fairly tall and quite a bit bigger than him. I would be able to stand up to my father, but no. I'm lanky and skinny and gangly and none of those things are good for fighting. My dad drunkenly rambled about how much I suck and how I've made his life miserable since mom died. I didn't listen to him, I never really do unless I'm in one of my sad moods. That's when he gets to me, but when I ignore him, nothing gets to me. I shrugged off what he said to me. I pulled my phone out of my back pocket to check the time, and it was 5:40. Time for the bus. 

I live in Ojai, California, a couple hours away from Los Angeles, but my high school is in LA, so the bus rides are about two hours. I used to go to school closer to my city, but when I went to high school, my mom wanted me to go to school in the city, for whatever reason. You'd be surprised how far away from the city most kids that go to my school are. I didn't mind the city. My friends all live in or near the city. Jason lives downtown, and Q and Seth live in the outskirts. Q's name is actually Quentin but we all call him Q. He used to live closer to me but his family moved closer to the city about a year ago. All of my friends have cars, though, so it doesn't matter how far I live. I have my license but I don't have a car. We just don't have that kind of money.

I stepped outside my front door to wait for the bus stop and I put my earbuds in and blasted some WSTR. My school is honestly so ghetto that we're literally all allowed to smoke in class. The school literally just does not care. I pulled out and lit one of my Newport menthols as the bus pulled up. The bus driver opened the doors and sized me up. Looked me up and down with clear disdain. I'm not a well-loved person around here so it made sense. I shrugged it off, took a hit of my cigarette and started walking to the bus. I climbed in and headed straight to the back and slumped down into one of the uncomfortable ass seats. I took my phone out of my back pocket again and pulled up Reddit, my favourite social media.

About a half an hour into the bus ride I light another cigarette and someone sat down next to me.

"That seat's taken," I said not bothering to see who it was.

"By whom?" Adam Parker asked. To be honest, I really have no idea why he was trying to sit next to me, I just wanted him to leave. He's part of a group of people that my friends and I don't get along with. One of his friends, Bryce was dating my friend Seth but he kept pressuring Seth to come out to his parents. His parents are super religious and homophobic so it's not safe for him to come out. Bryce got really toxic and their relationship ended really badly. His friends and my friends have kinda always had a feud since.

"By me," I retaliated. Adam moved my OGIO backpack onto my lap, pushing my cigarette into the window shoving the ashes onto my leg and burning me. I yelped and brushed them off quickly and re-lit my cigarette. Adam grabbed it out of my hand, took a hit, and gave it back.

"Just keep it I don't fuckin' want it now," I told him. He actually sucks and he's not the type of person I want to get involved with. But I have a feeling he's gonna be annoying the rest of the ride.

"Okay then. You don't gotta be a dick to me, I just wanted someone to sit by. I usually don't ride the bus to school, but my ride skipped out on me," He said. I looked at him, and he actually looked sincere. I gave him a small smile.

"Sorry, I just tend to be standoff-ish to people I don't know well. You can sit here if you want,"

He doesn't seem to be as much as an asshole as the rest of his friends are, but I'm not trying to get my hopes up. He probably just wants weed or something. 

The rest of the bus ride was mostly silent. I gave him a couple cigarettes throughout the ride but we didn't say much. At some point of the ride, I must have fell asleep because he was waking me up when we had gotten to the school. I usually get most of my sleep at school so it made sense why I fell asleep.

"Bye, Ty. See you soon," He told me before walking out of the bus.


	2. Teenage Dirtbag

I walked into school smoking another cigarette, walking to gym class. I hated gym class so fucking much. Not just because of exercise, I actually don't mind exercise and back in middle school I was on the school's soccer team. I was the captain, and the goalie and pretty much the star player. I quit right before my freshman year because my mom died after being diagnosed with Leukemia when I was in seventh grade. I just couldn't keep up with soccer anymore after my dad became an alcoholic and a shitter. So I needed something to keep my mind off of everything. I started hanging out with the stoners who are actually great people and like my family. I started smoking weed everyday after school and sometimes even in school. Everyone in my school smokes pot, but because of how I look and the people I hang out with, I'm a druggie. California logic.

Anyways, the reason I hate gym class is because of who I have it with. I don't have any friends in my class, and there are no stalls in the locker rooms so basically all of my classmates see all my bruises and cuts. Sometimes people are shitty and make fun of me, but it really doesn't bother me anymore so I don't care as much as I used to. It also doesn't help that my gym class is mostly freshmen. Freshmen boys are the worst. Straight up. They're smelly and horny and have an addiction to a flash drive. I took another hit of my cigarette and walked into the boy's locker room. My locker was in the back of the locker room, because I wanted to stay as far away from them as possible. I rolled my eyes at the freshmen hitting their Juuls as I walked past them and towards my locker. Smoke real fucking cigarettes if you want a nicotine addiction, not a flash drive. I didn't feel like changing for a class I'm gonna fail anyway.

A voice behind me piqued my interest.

"Ty? I didn't know you were in my gym class." Adam said. I hunched over. Fuck. I took a last hit of my cigarette and dropped it to put it out with my shoe. Not the class I wanted to see him in.

"Yeah I know, I didn't realize you were here either," I kinda ran together. Why the fuck does perfect Adam keep talking to me? Like yes, I can sell you weed or cigarettes, but you don't need to be my friend for it. That's happened to me so many times. I know they don't actually like me, just ask me for what you want and I'll get it for you, don't fake a friendship with me.

"Yeah I usually skip first period, but I figured I wouldn't today. Do you wanna be my gym partner?" He pushed. I turned back around since he obviously wasn't giving up. I gave a half-assed smile.

"Yeah, sure," I replied, and pushed past him to leave the locker room. I felt kinda bad for being kinda a dick to him when he seems to just want to be nice, but his friends and my friends just don't get along. I might as well make the fucking most of this class, though. I sat down at a random area of the gym floor and waited for Adam to start our workout. I turned my favourite Real Friends song "Hebron". I'm such a pop punk kid. I used to be a little emo bitch and honestly I guess I still am because I have long hair and all that shit, but I really love the pop punk music scene. They all just seem to have so much fun with their friends and seem to have good lives. I just wish I was happy. That's why I smoke weed. Because for a few hours I can just be. I can be happy. And when it wears off, I can smoke some more and be happy again. I do other drugs sometimes, but I usually just have weed around. I've done cocaine a couple of times and some psychedelics, but my favourite thing to do other than weed, was pills. I love opiates. They make me feel the most happy.

"Hey Ty, ready to get started?" He asked, sitting down. I nodded and pulled my earbuds out.

"Do you wanna just sit here, and not participate today? The teacher could not give less of a fuck, I promise." He accepted and we talked most of gym.

"So, why do you seem like you want to be friends with me? You've never talked to me before and your friends kinda have beef with me and my friends." I picked his brain. I wanted to know why perfect Adam with the perfect family and perfect hair wanted to be friends with a fucking loser like me.

"Well, my friends suck, as you know. They're all dicks to me, and I've kinda been looking for new friends, but no one really likes me or the people I used to hang out with so no one really wants to be friends with me. I've never really noticed you all that much, but you looked really lonely on the bus this morning, so I figured I could try to be your friend. I know it seems kinda odd." Adam explained. That makes a little bit of sense, but still, me?

"Oh. No it makes sense. My best friends used to be the soccer team but since I quit they all started to hate me so I befriended the "druggies" and they're way better friends than the anyone on the soccer team."

"Yeah," he started "You seem really cool and pretty down to Earth too, so I don't know why they would hate you."

"I think they were just mad I quit the team."

"Yeah but that's still not a valid reason to hate you," I just shrugged.

After school I met up with my buddies Seth, Q, and Jason went over to Jason's house to smoke out. He's was emancipated and has been since he was sixteen. Now that he's eighteen he gives me all of my weed and cigarettes and he's almost never busy so it's a constant supply as long as I have the money for it. I'm not gonna expect him to just give me free weed. We all just kinda fucked around on the way to his house, passing a cigarette around.

"Guys, guess who fuckin' sat next to me on the bus this morning?" I started. Seth and I were the only gay ones. But like, not together. It's also not a super big deal. We don't really talk about it too much unless like a big thing with someone happened. Like Seth and his ex's breakup.

"Who?" Q asked. 

"Adam fucking Parker." I said, passing the cigarette to Q. They were pretty surprised, considering our relationship with his friends.

"Why was he even on the bus? Doesn't he usually skip first period?" Seth asked

"Yeah, he said his ride "skipped out on him" or whatever," I laughed.

Jason's house was like a block or two away from the school so it only took us a couple minutes to walk home. I usually go home with them after school and stay with Q at night. I like to be at home as little as possible because my dad fucking sucks. His family is so amazing. They've kinda taken me in as their own. 

When we got to Jason's house, we all sat down in a circle in his living room. I offered to roll us all joints, so I reached over to the small coffee table for the bag of bud that Jason let us use.

"Jason do you have any rolling papers? Kinda need that for a joint," I asked. He nodded and reached for the papers in his pocket before handing them to me. I like rolling joints better than blunts because I don't have to deal with splitting it and taking the tobacco out. Seth put a wooden cutting board on my lap so that I had a flat surface to roll. I grabbed four papers and two grams of weed to roll in them. I placed the weed into all of the papers and then licked them closed. They were a little bit shitty, but I'm not that great at rolling so it doesn't surprise me. Better than I used to be, though.

We all grabbed our joints so that we could smoke them.

"Yo dude, these are nice, thank you," Jason said. I smiled at him as a thank you and passed my lighter around so that everyone else could light theirs.

"Dude, fuck high school," I sighed and slid down into my chair.

"For fucking real. That's gonna be my senior quote, bet!" Q agreed. We all chuckled at that.

"So hear this shit. As you guys know, Adam sat next to me on the bus but we didn't talk much. Then apparently he's in my gym class when I've literally never seen him before in that class. Then I ask him why he wanted to talk to me, thinking he was gonna ask for weed, but he says his friends are dicks to him and he just wants new friends and I seem nice. What the fuck does that even mean?" I ranted. This whole Adam shit has been confusing me all day.

"Dude what if he's like...trying to spy on us or something? Find out some shit about it?" Seth offered. We all looked at each other and then Seth.

"Dude you must be too high. He's not a spy, Seth," Jason said. He blushed and laughed.

"Maybe he's telling the truth. I mean his friends are all dicks so it wouldn't surprise me that they're dicks to him. Maybe he does just want some new friends," Q, who always plays devils advocate, interjected. I nodded and started biting my thumb nail. He's probably right.

"Yeah, you're probably right. But if he does want to be my friend, do I? Do I let him be friends with us after all he and his friends have done to Seth and Jason?" I'm so torn. On one hand, I want to give him a chance because he might actually be a good guy and a good friend, but on the other hand I want to keep my circle small. You don't get hurt that way.

"Maybe give him like a small chance. See what kind of person he is, and if he shows that he's a bad person, drop him," Jason said. I think that's a good idea.

I think that's what I'll do.


	3. Ocean Avenue

I was at the peak of my high when I got a call from my father.

"What,"

"Tyler, where the fuck are you?"

"Jason's house. Like fucking always. Where else would I be?

"You little-I told you that you needed to come home after school to clean the house because the government is coming to inspect us."

"You never fucking said that,"

"I told you that when I woke up you fucking idiot!"

"Whatever. I'll come home and clean but I'm staying the night with Q."

"Bye."

I was so mad. I was having a good time, we were vibing and then he ruined it. Like he always does. I grabbed my bag.

"Hey Jason, I'm gonna take your car and I'll come back when I'm done, kay?" I asked. Jason nodded. I walked out the door and lit a cigarette, and a wave of sadness crossed over me. I missed my mom. Honestly if she wouldn't have died, dad wouldn't be an alcoholic and I wouldn't be a druggie. I might have actually had a future. I'm not gonna be able to do anything with life anymore. It doesn't really bother me all that much, I never really had big plans but its whatever. I took a deep breath in and screamed "fuck" at the top of my lungs. I heard someone inside say "mood".

The weather was crisp since it was transitioning into fall. California fall is really mild, but there is a bit of a difference from summer. It's probably an average of 75 degrees in fall where we live.

Jason's car is pretty nice, I love to drive it. I'm only able to when it's an emergency. I got into it and shoved the keys into the ignition (hot and fresh out the kitchen). I didn't pull out for a while. I just sat there. Just thinking. Thinking how great it would be if my dad could just be a dad again. I just miss my dad. I shouldn't be doing drugs, I should be playing soccer with my dad while my mom watches and posts on her instagram. They should have been able to have another kid because my mom always wanted a girl and a boy. It's not fair. She died way before she should have. I slammed my hands into the top of the steering wheel and my head dropped and hit the horn, and I quickly jumped back up. I hit my cigarette. 

I don't hate my dad. I wish I did, it would be much easier and I wouldn't get so upset about him, but I do love him. He's my dad, you know? He was an amazing dad before my mom died, and I understand why he's a shit parent. My mother was the love of his life. I also turned into a shithead when she died because I had no reason not to be, so I can't blame him for always hating me. 

I smoked almost a whole pack on the two hour drive home. I was just so lost in thought and emerged in the Homesick album, when I got home it felt like only 15 minutes had past. I parked in my shitty excuse of a driveway and walked into the house. I lit up another cigarette and got cleaning so I could get back to Jason's as soon as possible. I cleaned the kitchen, the living room, dad's room, the laundry room, the bathrooms, and my room. I finished in about an hour and a half. As soon as I finished almost like clockwork, I got a text from my dad that he was on his way home.

I figured he would be drunk when he got home. So if he can be drunk, I can be high. I pretty much lost my high on the way home so I went upstairs, to my room and grabbed my paraphernalia box and went out to the backyard so the house wouldn't smell. The backyard was small. There was a couple trees and and old, dead garden that my mom used to keep up with. Kinda poetic, honestly. I walked over to my favourite tree. It was just a simple oak tree, but my mom and I used to sit under it and she would read me books and poetry under this tree. I sat down and grabbed my bowl out of my box. I only had a little bit of weed left but it was enough. I ran my smaller nug through my grinder and then packed it into my bowl. As I smoked the bowl I could literally feel my problems becoming less and less important. 

My heart started racing, as if it was a drum and someone was just going to town on it. My vision started to slow, like a lagging computer, and I could tell I was high. The world around me started to matter less to me. Sometimes, if I'm in a weird mood, I get in a sad high but it doesn't happen that often. 

I sat outside for a bit while I was waiting for my dad to come home. The weather is so nice and cool. I used to skate mostly in the fall since it's so nice out, but Q and I haven't been out skating in a while. Not for any particular reason, we just haven't gotten around to it. My mother's favourite season was fall. She loved to go on picnics with my dad, my best friend, Toby, and I. He was the striker on the soccer team and we were inseparable. We were best friends from when I was 6 to freshman year. He got the soccer team to turn against me when I quit, even when he knew my situation.

I try not to dwell on my life. I had a great childhood. My life was perfect until I was 14 and I'm very thankful for that. It just kinda sucks now, but I know others have it worse.

I pulled out another cigarette and lit it. I used to hate smoking, and would cut my mom's cigarettes in half as she was smoking them. Now, however, they truly are the love of my life. Most of my thoughts are when I can have another cigarette and when I smoke them, I get so euphoric. I'm honestly disappointed in myself for smoking, but I have no intentions to stop.  
I put my box in my tree and headed back inside and sat on the couch and called Q.

"Hey Ty, whats up?" He asked.

"Hey is it okay if I stay the night tonight? I don't really wanna be here tonight,"

"Yeah of course that's always okay. Is everything alright?"

"Yeah yeah, I just feel like my dad's gonna be mad after the government leaves, so I'd rather be at your house." I told him.

"Okay yeah just come back over to Jason's when you can,"

"Okay, see you soon,"

I've stayed at Jason and Seth's house before, but it's not the same as staying at Q's house. Q's family is like an actual family to me. They've saved my ass more times than I can count. Q's mom is an absolute saint. She reminds me a lot of my mom. They were there for me when I tried to kill myself, they were there for me when my dad beat the shit out of me, they've been there through it all. And I love them so much.

It was 9 o'clock when my dad showed up, along with the government. He was drunk, but he was handling himself really nicely. He greeted me like a dad but not my dad.

"Hey kid, how was school?" He asked, somehow not sounding cheesy. He was functioning super well for him being drunk. I don't know how he pulled it off.

"It was...school." I joked, going along with his lie. My dad took one of the government workers on a tour of our house while the other one interviewed me. This was so weird. Dad must have gotten charged with something because they've never done this before. I've never been asked questions before.

"So you're a junior this year? What's your GPA?" She asked. I'm not quite sure what my GPA has anything to do with my home-life but I answered nonetheless.

"1.0," I shrugged, looking away. I was ashamed of it, honestly. I wish I could do better. She nodded and wrote my fucking grade-point average down.

"How often are you at home," I thought for a moment. I'd say 'as little as possible', but that makes it seem like something's going on. I don't want my dad in trouble. I had to find a new way to word this.

"I'm not usually home. I like to hang out with my friends a lot. I spend the night and my buddy Q's house most nights,"

"Why is that, Ty?" She asked.

"I just really like my friends. They understand me. They don't judge me like absolutely everyone else does." I told her.

"And who are your friends?"

"Seth, Quentin, and Jason," I responded.

"What do you like to do for fun, Ty?" I really didn't like her saying my name.

"I like to listen to pop punk music, skateboard, and eat pizza with my friends."

"What's your relationship with your father?" There it was. There's the burning question. My dad didn't get charged with anything and she didn't care about my GPA. Someone had called CPS on my father. They always ask this question. I should have known, I've had CPS called on my dad many times before. Q's parents called CPS on my dad once when he beat the shit out of me, and wanted to get guardianship of me, but it didn't work. My dad somehow pulled out of that and made me say I just got into a fight. 

"We don't really have a relationship. It kinda disappeared after my mother died. I was always busy with soccer, and then after I quit, I was always with my friends. We're just not as close."

"Uh huh. And why did you quit soccer?"

"Because I just didn't have the mental capacity to after my mom died. And I wanted lip piercings." I told her, kinda joking at the end.

"What do you mean, mental capacity?" When she said the last two words, it seems like a cold front came out of her mouth. She was judging me hardcore and it was honestly really bothering me.

"I mean, I couldn't keep up with it. I just had so much shit to deal with, that I could not handle being the captain of a soccer team. I lost a lot of friends and everyone was really mad at me for years but I had to do something good for me because I probably would have killed myself if I didn't quit. No one realizes how much teenagers have to deal with and then they fucking judge them when they are just trying to take care of themselves and I'm just so fucking sick of it." I ranted. She was slightly taken aback. She wrote something down and gave a sheepish smile.

"I think we're done here," And she and her partner left. Once they drove away, my dad and I looked at each other for about 30 seconds. There was sadness in both of our eyes. He's a good guy. I know somethings stopping him from being a great dad again and it's the death of my mother and alcohol. He knew I knew the same thing. I lit a cigarette, and walked out the front door ready to go back to Jason's.


	4. My Own Worst Enemy

I woke up in a cold sweat in Q's bedroom. I used to sleep on an air mattress here, but they recently got me a bed to sleep in. Q's parents were so sweet to me. All I did was bring them a bunch of problems and shit that they didn't have to deal with. But they always did. No matter what, they were there for me. My mom would have wanted a family like them to take me in after she died. Q's mom would never replace my mom in my eyes but she's like my second mom. I sat up and rubbed the tired out of my eyes. I grabbed my phone off the bed and checked the time. It was 4:30 in the morning. I decided I probably wasn't going to get back to sleep so I stumbled into his bathroom. I needed a fucking shower.

I splashed my face with some water. I opened his medicine cabinet, searching for Vicodin, or Oxycontin, or just something to get high off of. Q had surgery on his knee a couple years back, after tearing his ACL in basketball. He only took like half of his prescriptions so I take the rest as I need them. Pills are my favourite drugs to get high off. They make me be able to chill and just be happy. Like weed but much better. I've bought pills a couple times, but usually they're just lying around the houses I stay in. A couple here and there won't make a difference anyways.

As I continued my search, I rolled my hand over something sharp and immediately ripped my hand back, but found myself putting it back. I grabbed the sharp object, finding out that it was a razor. I considered using it. I hadn't cut myself in a while. Well, what the hell why not? I pulled up my shirt, to find a few mostly faded scars on my stomach. Why not add a few more? I drew thin little crimson lines onto my stomach. It didn't hurt. It didn't feel like anything honestly. Why was I doing this? There's nothing even wrong with me. I washed off the razor, put it back into it's place and washed off the cuts with a washcloth. It sounds so like, middle school emo to cut yourself but it's something I do to not kill myself.

I looked in the medicine cabinet one more time. I found a bottle of Vicodin with one more pill in there. Just enough. I popped it in my mouth and chewed it. Fuck, it feels so nice to take opiates. I needed a cigarette while I waited for the Vic to hit me, so I went back into Q's room to grab my cigarettes and took them back into the bathroom. I lit one and sat on the tub while I smoked it. I felt myself becoming less sober every second. Time started to slow, my ears started to ring and I felt slightly nauseous. My cigarette was only half finished but it was making me sick so I put it out with the sink and threw it away. Shower time.

I turned on the shower and waited for a second for the water to get hot. I grabbed my my phone from off the tub and put on my pop punk playlist. It was filled with everything from Blink 182 to Real Friends. Music is one of my favourite things in the world. It just makes the world a little bit better. Pop punk is my favourite, but all my friends listen to rap music, which is mainly what we listen to. 

The water was hot enough so I got in and put my hair under the water. I felt myself nodding off as the water hit my body. Nodding is something you get on opiates. Not nearly as much as Xanax since it literally is supposed to put you to sleep, but it's similar. I was standing under the water for what felt like forever before I figured I should actually wash my hair. 

I swear it was only a couple minutes that I was in the shower after I had finished washing my hair and my body, but Q was knocking on the door.

"Ty, you've been in the shower forever. It's 6:30! I need to take one too!" He yelled. Fuck I had been in the shower for at least an hour and a half. I turned the water off and nearly fell when I tried to get out. 

"Fuck, gimme a second!" I yelled back. Shit shit shit shit. I grabbed my towel off the laundry basket by his sink and put it around my body and opened the door. Q was standing there with his arms crossed, trying to look angry but he just laughed. 

"Why were you in the shower for so long?" He asked.

"Uhhh, I zoned out."

"You're high, aren't you?" He rolled his eyes. I laughed.

"Yeah a little bit." He walked into the bathroom and turned the water back on. He just sighed and looked at me.

"Go get dressed in there," he said while pointing to his room, "we're skipping breakfast today."

He only took like a 5 minute shower. He never takes long showers. He hated them. He came back out once he was done to ask if I wanted to smoke with him in the bathroom before we had to leave. I nodded and walked back into the bathroom for the third time this morning. 

"So what time did you wake up, Ty?" Q asked.

"Around 4am," I giggled.

"You dumb bitch. I thought I heard some rat scrounging around in my medicine cabinet!"

"Okay, okay," I put my hands up, "I was looking for your Vicodin." He just laughed and shook his head.

When it was time for us to leave, we grabbed our backpacks from his room and headed out. Arabelle was eating a bowl of cereal and some toast in the kitchen and Q's mom was drinking coffee in the living room. She looked up from her glasses and saw us and stood up.

"Boys will you please take A to school today? She missed the bus," She pleaded. Q and I looked at each other. He sighed and agreed.

"Yeah. We'll take her," He turned to his sister, "just hurry up, okay?" Arabelle nodded and returned to her breakfast. Q's mom looked quizzically at me. She always cocked her head to the side a little bit when she was trying to read someone.

"You feeling okay, hun?" She asked me. Fuck. She knows I'm high. I hate when she knows when I'm on pills. She's okay with drinking and smoking because she knows if she's strict, we're just going to be sneaky about it. She always says as long as were safe its okay. She doesn't like hard drugs, obviously, though so I feel bad.

"Uh, yeah, I'm just sleepy," I said with a sheepish smile. She bit her thumbnail and gave a small "uh huh". She turned to look at Arabelle.

"Okay, come on your brothers are going to be late. You can take your toast with you." I smiled at Arabelle and we all walked out to Q's car. Q drives a Dodge Dart, which is one of the shittiest cars ever. It looks nice, don't get me wrong, but everything that can go wrong with it, will. Without a doubt. I got into the passenger side, and everyone else got into their respective places. Q's bluetooth connected and started playing his Migos playlist. 

Arabelle's school wasn't too far, which was good. It only took us like 15 minutes to get there. I turned around to look at her before she got out of the car.

"Have a good day at school, A, I love you," I told her. 

"Bye, love you too!" She yelled while she got out and ran over to her group of friends. She's so sweet. I swear I love her more than her own brother does. 

Jason's house was only like a block away from her school, and then like a block away from our school. We were cutting it a little bit close, though, so Q hauled ass to his house.

We got to Jason's around 7:30, meaning we had 10 minutes to get to school. Jason ran out of the house with a blunt in his hand, followed by Seth running behind him, both of them jumping in the car. Q and I ran to the car as well. We hotboxed while driving to school. Today was going to be a good day.

We pulled into the student parking lot, and Jason put the blunt out in his ashtray. The car was so smokey, it was probably dangerous to drive in, but whatever. Fuck, I was so sleepy. But I was content. Weed and opiates are so good to mix. You get so unbelievably content and happy.

It was like 7:38 when we got out of the car and started walking up to our doors. We were greeted by Mrs. Anderson. She was the fucking goat. She was super chill and actually helped you skip class. Many class periods were spent hiding out in her room and chilling with her.

"Well, well, well, looked who the cat dragged in! Hi boys," She smiled. We all laughed.

"Hi Mrs. Anderson," We said. She looked us up and down, and then looked at me.

"Ty, you're high."

"Well, technically, we all are. But yes. I am," She just shook her head 

"Have a good day, boys."

We all had different first hours today, so when we got into the school, we split up. Q had sociology, Jason had stats, Seth had English, and I had Algebra 2. It was just down the main hallway once you get into the school. I was so tired, that I barely felt my feet moving to my classroom, but I eventually made it, and I looked up and saw Adam.

"Suh dude," I greeted him

"Dude, suh." He said right back. I lit a smoke and gave him one. I started to say something as my phone went off. Jason had texted our group chat to tell us that he couldn't hang out today since he had to see his little sister. We all decided to do our own things today.

"You wanna hang out today?" I asked him. He pretended to think about it and laughed.

"Sure, how about we meet up at Grand Park?" I told him that it was a date and we went to our separate math classes.

The rest of the day was pretty much boring, I was nodding through most of my classes and didn't eat anything for lunch. I almost never eat anything when I'm on opiates. Shit's way too nauseating. Of course I didn't do any of my classwork either. When school got out, I had to walk to the park since I didn't have a car. I popped my earbuds in and listened to some Neck Deep. I passed the elementary schoolers walking home and a couple of them were walking close by me on their way to the park as well. 

The walk wasn't that far, it only took me like ten to fifteen minutes to get there. Adam was already there and he was sitting on the swings waiting for me. I smiled and waved at him and walked up to him. I was a little bit nervous. My Vicodin had wore off at this point, which fucking sucked, so I was my twitchy anxious self again. 

"Yo wassup how was school?" He asked me with a smile. Okay he's lowkey cute. 

"It sucked. My Vicodin wore off at like 2:00 and I don't have any more so here we are,"

"Oh you take Vicodin? I didn't know you were like that." He said with a fairly shitty tone in his voice.

"Like what?" I piped back.

"I just didn't know you fucked with hard shit. Like I don't know I just thought you smoked weed and that was like, it."

"Oh. I mean I don't make a habit of it but yeah I mean I do them occasionally."

"Oh. Okay," He shrugged and I grabbed my cigarettes from my pocket, and grabbed two out. One for me, and one for Adam. He grabbed it from me and I grabbed my lighter and sat down on the swing next to him. 

"You know, I really only smoke when I'm with you," He grabbed my lighter from me. "Like I have a pack at home but I really don't smoke all that often. You're a bad influence on me, Ty," He laughed and lit his cigarette, and then passed the lighter to me. I chuckled and lit my own cigarette.

"Yeah I should probably not offer you them as much as I do, but I don't know, I like to share I guess."

"I get that. I don't think I've ever not shared my weed or anything. Like it's just better to do things with other people you know?"

"Yeah yeah totally. You almost like can't not share your weed. Like no one likes a stingy stoner."

"For sure, for sure." 

The park was not as busy as it usually was, which was odd. Most kids flock to the park after school. There was maybe like 10 kids here and a couple parents. Some of the kids were playing Freeze Tag and the rest of the kids were just roaming around the playground. There was a giant pirate ship playground where they were playing. It was dope looking, not gonna lie. I would be all over that shit if I were their age.

Adam and I smoked and talked all day. Once the kids went home we fucked around on the play equipment for a little bit, which was a lot of fun. Playing at parks when you're grown is so fun and no one ever talks about it. We also walked around the nature trail for a while, talking some more. He told me about how he usually takes the most care of his sisters. He always got up with them, made them breakfast, lunch, and dinner. He was basically their dad. I thought that was super sweet that he cares that much about his sisters to do that. Q's mom does everything for Arabelle, but Q almost never helps out with her. 

"Hey it's getting late. My sisters are gonna need dinner soon and I still have to help them with their homework. I can drive you home if you want," He told me. Fuck, I lived so far away. 

"I live in Ojai,"

"Oh shit. Well I can drive you to Quentin's if you'd prefer."

"No I need to go home tonight. I can find a way home, it's no big deal," I told him. Partly because he had to get home soon, and partly because I didn't want him to come to my house. I hated having people at my house, even if my dad's not home. Q had only even been there for emergencies.

"You know what, no. I'll drive you home it's fine." 

"No seriously, I got it. Go get to your sisters."

"No seriously, seriously. My dad's off today he can fucking make them dinner and help them with their homework. I do it every single night, one night is not going to kill him. Don't even stress, I got you." I thanked him and we started walking to his car. His fucking nice ass Mitsubishi Evolution. Of course he drives an evo, what else would he drive. I felt so bad for him having to take me home. I really wished I had a car. That would make everyone's life so much easier. 

The drive to my house was a little bit shorter than it usually was, since Adam drove super fast. We got there in under an hour and a half. That's like record time. He shifted his car into park and looked at me. 

"So we made it."

"We did. We made it."

"Your house is really nice. Like I knew Ojai houses were nice but like, damn. That wrap around porch! Oh my god that's nice." It sickened me to know that I did have a nice house. It was fucking trashed on the inside, and the good memories in that house were spoiled knowing that I've tried to kill myself twice in there. My dad beat me fucking shitless in that house. I've done so much cocaine and tweaked the fuck out in that house. Everything that was nice about that house, was since dead. Quite fucking literally.

"You should see the inside. It's awful," I told him. He just shrugged and looked back to revel in the house again.

"Well I should go. You gotta be home and I'm fucking tired so I need some sleep," I said, grabbing my backpack. He nodded and looked back at me.

"I had fun with you today. It was nice to hang out with someone who isn't an asshole." 

"I'm not that great, I promise."

"Yeah you are, come on. Oh hey, will you leave me one more cigarette? I'll give you my pack tomorrow if it's a problem." 

"No yeah I will," I grabbed my cigarettes and pulled one out for him. I kissed it and handed it to him. Cringey, I know but I thought it was a cute thing to do. "A cigarette with love."  
He laughed and smiled.

"Thank you. I'll see you tomorrow have a good night," I nodded.

"You have a good night as well." I said and got out of his car. He waited to pull out of the driveway until I was walking into my house. 

My house was trashed, like it always was. I stumbled around some trash to get to the kitchen so I could grab something to eat. I was fucking starving. I genuinely didn't remember the last time I ate something. My dad was in the kitchen, drunk as fuck. I just ignored him and went to the fridge.

"Son, I want to talk to you." My dad said.

"Don't call me that," I responded. That wasn't really an argument starter, I just didn't want him to call me that.

"Tyler, are you gay?" My parents always called me Tyler. They said if they wanted me to be called Ty, they would have named me Ty.

"Yeah." I said. My answers were stoic. He deserved no emotion from me. He grabbed my shoulder and turned me around. I flinched, expecting him to hit me. He gave me a hug instead.

"Tyler, I know I'm not the best father. I might just be the worst father ever. But I want you to know I love you and support you. It's just been so hard without your mother. I miss Mary so much, Tyler. And I know you do too. I see it in your eyes. I'm trying to get better. I really am. When CPS came to the house, I wasn't drunk. I swear to you I was 100% sober. When I greeted you, it was genuine. I could tell you were high, but I don't blame you. But I came home sober because I just couldn't lose you too. And that day I realized how much I missed being a father. Your father. I missed so much of your life. You're 17 now. And I feel like I didn't even know you when you were 14, 15, and 16. I'm sorry Tyler. I'm going to rehab tomorrow. I'll be back in six months. You can stay with Q. I love you." And gave me another hug. I started crying.

"I love you too," I barely choked out as I was crying into his shirt. I felt like a little kid again. We both just sobbed. Fuck man. This is all I wanted. My dad to get better.

"My co-worker is taking me to the airport tomorrow so you can use my car while I'm gone. I'll buy you a car when I get back, I promise," He said with a laugh.

"Thank you. I'm going to go to bed, but I'll see you off in the morning."

"Okay, goodnight."

"'Night," I said and left the kitchen with some grapes I found. I stumbled over some more trash on my way to my room. I let my backpack fall off my back and onto the floor and flopped on my bed. What the fuck just happened? I truly thought my dad was never going to get better. I thought this was going to be my life until I could move out, or until I killed myself. I was proud of him, though. 

I finished eating my grapes, plugged my phone in and fell the fuck asleep. Good-fucking-night.


	5. Father of Mine

I woke up to my dad calling me downstairs. I almost forgot about what happened last night. It didn't feel real that my dad was actually going to get help. Despite all the shit he'd done to me, he was still my dad, and I wanted him to get help. I wanted my dad back. I sleepily stumbled off of my bed and headed downstairs to see my dad off.

My dad was standing by the door with a couple suitcases. He looked nice, freshly washed hair and some comfy clothes on. He looked a lot like me, same chestnut hair, and the same green eyes as me. We were the only ones in our family with green eyes. He looked a lot better than he typically did when he was drinking. When he was drinking he had a constant haunted look on his face, as if he saw my dead mother every minute of his life. His hair usually was unkempt and his clothes were sloppy. Now, he looked just like he did when he wasn't drinking. 

"How'd you sleep last night?" He asked, making small talk to avoid the obvious elephant in the room. His ring finger was nervously tapping on the handle of his suitcase.

"Uh, good I guess. Better sleep than I usually get, so," I tried not to make eye contact.

"I'm gonna miss you when I'm away,"

"Are you?" I crossed my arms over my chest. "I mean, for the past 3 years you've told me you didn't love me at least 3 times a week." It was probably not the time to bring this up, but if he was gonna get the most of rehab, I want him to really understand what he had done to me for 3 years of my life.

He sighed, "Are we gonna talk about this right now?"

"Yeah, it would be nice to."

"You know nothing you say has any meaning when you're drunk, Tyler."

"Okay sure, but what about all the times you beat me? You broke one of my ribs when I was 15, Dad. Q's parents literally tried to adopt me, and would have if you didn't refuse to sign away your parental rights. It got so bad that I would have a panic attack just thinking about coming home because every time I did, I would get hit. You abused me. For 3 years of my life." I wanted him to know that he wasn't getting away with everything he put me through. I wanted him to know that it hurt me, and will for the rest of my life.

"Tyler, I...I don't know what to say. I don't remember any of that."

"Of course you don't, because you were drunk. But you don't remember the few times you were sober and saw all the black eyes and bruises I had? I had Q's mom show me how to use makeup so I could hide all the bruises at school. It was really, really bad."

"I'm sorry. I know I can never make it go away, but I'm gonna make it better. I'm gonna get help, and I'm going to stay sober. I promise you that. Oh hey-the other day, I found some Xanax in your medicine cabinet. Are you still doing Xanax? I thought I told you to stop doing that, like a year ago." This man was really about to tell me not to do Xanax when he's literally going to rehab.

"Yeah I mean, I don't really do Xanax anymore, those were to help my anxiety while I was home, but I feel like you shouldn't really be telling me what to do. You don't really have a leg to stand on."

"I'm still your father, Tyler."

"I get that, but you didn't "tell me" to stop doing Xanax. You hit me twice and told me "my mother would never love a tweaker" and that you wished I had died instead of Mom. So like, grade A parenting. That was a perfect plan to get me to stop doing drugs." I glared at him.

"Fuck," He rubbed his eyes and pushed his hair back. "I know. I shouldn't have said that to you and I shouldn't have hit you. That was awful of me and I'm really, truly sorry,"

"It's whatever now," I said and looked at my feet.

"My co-worker is here, I gotta go. I'm so sorry for everything I put you through these last years. My keys are on the island in the kitchen. Oh, and I'm gonna be in Vogue Recovery Center in Vegas. If you, or Q's parents, or anyone needs to get in contact with me, you can reach me there. Okay, I love you and I'll see you in six months, give or take."

"Love you," I told him and I watched him leave the house that he has wreaked havoc in and destroyed, and get in his very kind looking co-worker's car and drive away. The past year, I have spent very little time at this house. I was almost always at Q's house or one of the other guys' house, so life won't be much different for the next six months. I didn't feel like I had a dad anyway, so it's not like I can "get away with more stuff" or anything.

The bus was going to get to my house soon, so I needed to get ready and it needed to be fast. I ran back upstairs and grabbed my essentials, earbuds and cigarettes. I figured I didn't even need my backpack, since I never did my homework anyway. Since our school is so shitty, they passed everyone. Of course there were the scholars, who were just hit with bad luck by attending Shell High, but the majority of us realized how little our efforts mattered. The scholars were the ones that the schools would ride off of. They were all on student council, national honor society, and other school programs and the school would pimp them off to the big guys of education. They had to keep the rest of us low-key with things like allowing us to cheat on standardized tests so that they would look the best. Everyone knew, though, that Shell High was the worst high school in Los Angeles.

Once I had grabbed my smokes and earbuds, I made my way to the kitchen, and compulsively stepped extremely quiet, in hopes to not wake my dad. But my dad wasn't home. He had Pavlov'd me into always being super quiet in the kitchen, because if he was sleeping on the couch and I woke him up, there would be hell to pay. It was just conditioned into me now, and it was going to take a long time for me to forget that.

My dad must have made coffee this morning while he was getting ready, since there was already some in the pot, and I'm usually the one to make it in the morning. I grabbed one of our travel mugs. My mom always loved to collect them. There were solid pastel ones, metallic ones, and different sized ones. Her favourites were the ones that had words or phrases on them. I often saw her drinking out of the ones that said "But first...coffee", "Coffee is just mom cocaine", and "Sorry I'm late, I didn't want to come". I picked the one that was just a simple baby blue. The coffee was still hot, thankfully and I nearly burned my hand pouring it into the mug. I never used creamer unless Q and I were at our favourite coffee spot. I usually preferred black coffee. I twisted the lid onto my mug and pulled out my phone to look through before my bus got to my house. 

The bus arrived after like 5 minutes, so I threw on some vans and headed out the door, locking it behind me. While I was walking to my seat at the back of the bus, I secretly hoped that Adam's ride would skip out on him again so that we could talk for a little bit. 

"Hey look, that fucking fag Ty still showed up. Hey tweaker, did Mitch's dick smell good?" Some kid yelled at me. I didn't even know his name.

"I'm not a fucking tweaker," I mumbled to myself. What was he talking about? Mitch and I haven't even really spoken in almost a year. Mitch was an ex of mine, who wasn't really an ex. We had a thing for like 3 months last year but we never officially dated. I brushed it off and sat down in my seat. People can't go a week without saying some dumb shit to me. I put my earbuds in and blasted The Story So Far.

I must've fallen into some weird form of dissociation because it felt like no time had past before Adam sat down next to me. He pulled one of my earbuds out, which usually would piss me off, but he looked really freaked out.

"Ty, have you seen the video?" He asked.

"What video?"

"There's a video going around of you snorting something off Mitch's dick. I think it was probably coke or something."

"What?!" Okay, what the fuck. 

"Yeah, look," He pulled out his phone and pulled up Instagram to show me the video "It was posted last night. I don't know how long ago it was but a lot of people are talking about it. I'm surprised you haven't seen it." I shook my head and looked back up at him. I subconsiously started tapping my heel, which was something I did when I was anxious.

"I literally don't remember doing that. I don't even know who's house that is," I dropped my head into my hands. "Fuck."

"You don't remember it?" He asked with a judgey tone in his voice.

"No! I was on so much coke and Xanax when I was with Mitch that I really don't remember a whole lot of that time,"

"I mean it's clearly you guys. It can't be anyone else,"

"No I'm not surprised that I did it, I'm just surprised Mitch did it. Fuck, he's going to freak out when he sees this, if he already hasn't."

"What do you mean?" He asked. He clearly didn't understand the party scene with this, and how he acted about the Vicodin.

"I mean, Mitch isn't like that. He did always try to match me, so if I don't remember it, he sure as shit doesn't. But someone must have dared him or I must have begged him because he definitely wouldn't do any of that," I explained. I really couldn't care less that I'm in the video, people can say whatever the fuck they want about me, but Mitch really wants to get into a prestigious college. This could seriously fuck with his reputation. 

"Mitch isn't as perfect as you think he is,"

"I know Mitch pretty well, okay, I think I know how he is," I get Mitch doesn't get along with everyone, but Adam doesn't need to be a dick. Mitch is a really good guy. We just didn't work out.

"Yeah I know him pretty well too,"

"Okay look, I don't know what you're trying to imply. Really, I don't. But you can take it down a notch. I'm just worried for him, that's all. I don't even know why you care,"

"I don't know. Mitch has just done a lot of shit to me, and hasn't done much to make up for it,"

"Yeah well you can stop being a dick whenever you feel like it. Like I said, I'm just worried,"

"Yeah," I pulled out my cigarettes and took two out, one for me and one for him. He gave me a small smile as a thank you and we lit our cigarettes. We pretty much sat in silence again for the rest of the ride. I don't know what the history between him and Mitch was but I'm sure it wasn't like ours. Mitch was the only person I let come to my house. I really didn't "let him" come over, he just showed up at the perfect time. I wanted to protect my friends. Even Q. I loved them and they were my family, but I didn't want them to see how I lived. There was no reason for them to be at my house. 

One time, my dad had a particularly bad day at work. The day before he had been really nice to me and we played video games together for a long time, so I thought it would be a similar story the next day. So I came home from school, excited to see him and he just started screaming at me. It was one of our worst fights ever.  
~  
I walked into my house and threw my bag down on the ground. I didn't see my dad in the living room so I decided to call him.

"Dad! I'm home!" I yelled. 

"Shut. The fuck up!" I got in return. I stepped back. My dad stumbled out of his room drunk as fuck and walked towards me.

"You don't get to yell like that in this house! I pay the bills!" 

"I'm sorry, Dad, I just wanted to tell you that I'm home," I shouldn't have been as shocked as I was, in hindsight. The days that my Dad was nice to me was very few and far between, but I just had a small instance of hope that he might be different today. That was my mistake.

"Yeah and why the fuck is that? Why are you here? I don't fucking want you here! Go live somewhere fucking else!"

"You don't think I've tried? Q's parents have been trying to adopt me for a year!"

"Oh well why isn't that working out for you?" He mocked. He always did this. This exact shit has happened countless times. He tells me to live somewhere else, I tell him I've tried, and he mocks me. 

"Because you won't sign away your fucking parental rights!"

"Don't fucking talk to me like that!" He screamed and smacked me right across the face. I wanted to keep strong and not cry, but I couldn't. It was just a reflex, and I started crying.

"What the fuck?" I cried and ran up to my room and shut the door. I cried into my hands and slid down the door, hearing my dad beat on the door behind me. He was screaming at me, but I wasn't listening to him. All I wanted was to come home to how my dad was yesterday. I should have known that wasn't going to happen.

"Go the fuck away!" I screamed at him. He just kept banging on the door, and I just kept crying. This was my life. My fucked up, shitty life. I stood up and opened the door to face him. He put his fists down for a second so I saw that as my opportunity. I slammed my fists on his chest and pushed him down the stairs and closed the door again. I knew it wasn't long before he got up again, way more angry, so I ran into my bathroom. I grabbed my bottle of Xanax from my medicine cabinet. I always said it was for anxiety, and it was sometimes, but for the most part, it was just recreational. I stomped back into my room to face my dad, who was steaming. 

"T-"

"I will take all these fucking pills and kill myself right fucking now if you don't leave me the fuck alone!" I screamed. That was the only thing I knew to do. I knew it probably wouldn't deter him, but it would be an out for me.

"Oh shut the fuck up, Tyler! Those are fucking Asprin anyway," He mocked, again.

"Try Xanax!"

"Oh, so you're a tweaker now? I knew you were a lot of things, but I didn't know you popped pills,"

"I'm not a fucking tweaker, they're for anxiety but I will not hesitate to fucking kill myself right now. Now please, leave me the fuck alone!"

"Don't fucking swear at me!" He screamed and hit me again. He hit me so hard I fell to the floor. I started crying again.

"Mom would be really fucking proud of you right now. Really proud," I said softly. My Dad swung his arm down and hit me again.

"Well your mother would never love a fucking tweaker!" He screamed. His voice was so fucking loud. I flinched every time he screamed. My dad saw my Xanax bottle on the floor, since it had been knocked out of my hand. He grabbed it up and whipped it at me with all of his force.

At this moment, I thought it was it. I was either going to down all these pills, that were just thrown at me, or I was going to kill myself after he left me alone. Either way, I thought tonight was going to be my last night on Earth. My dad was still screaming at me, and Mitch ran into my room. He had driven me home a couple times, but I never ever invited him in or anything. It was a shock to see him at my house, but I was so glad he was there. 

"Mitch?" My dad spun around to face him.

"Get the fuck out of my house!" My dad screamed and pointed at the door. Mitch flinched as a bit of spit landed on his face. My dad always spit when he screamed. It was fucking disgusting.

Mitch ran over to me and grabbed my hand and we ran out of the house. Night in shining armor kinda deal. We didn't stop running until we got into his car. The keys were still in the ignition and he pulled out and drove away from my house. My dad had run after us and was standing on the front porch, watching us.

"How did you know what was happening?" Like I said, Mitch had dropped me off at home a couple times, but he never came into my house. He knew entry level shit about my dad, but had never met him.

"I don't know. I just had a sick feeling that you were in trouble because you weren't answering my texts or calls and I knew you were at home. So I dropped by, and I'm glad I did. What was going on?"

"My dad just started screaming at me. He hit me and whipped a bottle of Xanax at my face, after I threatened to take all of them if he wouldn't leave me alone."

"You threatened to kill yourself?" Mitch worried. 

"Yeah after my dad hit me!" I reminded him. Q and Mitch are close and Q's told him about my suicide attempts before so I think Mitch gets worried about me trying to kill myself, even if he forgets everything else.

"Right, yeah. I'm sorry."

"Speaking of Xanax, do you have anything at your house? I left mine,"

"Yeah I think I've still got some coke,"

~  
We got to the school, and Adam and I still hadn't said anything. I spend the time wondering if Mitch had seen the video and what was going to happen to him. I wasn't going to college anyway, so the worst that could happen to me, is people calling me gay or a tweaker, which is what they already do. 

"Ty, I'm sorry. I shouldn't have been a dick.' He apologized. 

"It's cool, really. I just was worried for him, that's all," I replied. He nodded. 

The school day was, yet again, uneventful. I didn't do any of my work, I fucked around with the boys when we got the chance to, didn't eat anything at lunch, the works. I didn't see Mitch at school, which wasn't super surprising. I know this will all blow over in a few days. If any of the school administration would listen to me, I'd probably talk to them to try to clear his name.

Seth and Jason took Jason's car to his house since Seth rides the bus, and Q and I took his car to Jason's house after school. It wasn't a long drive, short enough to walk even, but Jason likes to flex his car. 

"So how's Adam?" Q asked. 

"Uh, he's fine. He was actually kinda a dick this morning but I don't know what that was about,"

"What do you mean?"

"He told me about the video and I just said that wasn't like Mitch, cuz it isn't" Q nodded in agreement. "And he just said that he knows Mitch pretty well or whatever,"

"Oh. Weird,"

"Totally. He apologized though, so I mean I guess we're cool,"

"Ask him if he wants to roll with us?"

"Huh?"

"C'mon text him. Tell him we're doing molly tonight and he can come over if he wants," Q was always good about including people in our group. He never wanted anyone to be left out. He really is one of the kindest people I know.

We got to Jason's house and we plopped down in his living room, ready to get rid of the school day and begin the real day. Jason, like I said, got emancipated when he was 16. His parents died in a car crash when he was 13 and him and his little sister were put into foster care. He never liked the foster system, even if he was in only a couple houses. He got emancipated, under the assumption that he and his sister would have a place to live together, just them. His uncle gave him the money for a lawyer, and a house. What Jason didn't know, was that their foster family wanted to adopt his sister. So that's why every once and a while he can't hang out. 

Seth started rolling a blunt for us, to get started before we did molly. I would never say this to Jason, but Seth was the best roller in our group. Jason rolls better than Q and I but he doesn't stand a chance to Seth. 

"Ty, did you text Adam to see if he wants to come over?" Q pressed. Man that boy really be trying to play Cupid isn't he.

"Yeah I did, he said he'll be over in a few," Jason turned on his Travis Scott playlist and we smoked for a while, waiting for Adam to show up.

Adam showed up shortly after we finished our blunt. I greeted him at the door with a hug, and he seemed like he left his animosity at school, which was good. You don't wanna do molly on bad vibes. It fucks the experience up. 

"C'mon sit, we're about to get the molly," I told him.

"Hell yeah, I won't say no to that," So Adam fucks with psychedelics, but not pills. Got it. Jason went into his room and grabbed his shit. I didn't know how much he had but apparently it was enough for 5 people so it had to be a pretty big amount. It's hard to get psychedelics out here. Pills are easy, because so many people did labor out here so a lot of people get injuries and get prescribed pills. 

"Here you go," Jason said and handed everyone their points. He turned the music up and told us on the count of three, we'd snort it. I hadn't done psychedelics in so long, I was ready to just fucking chill. It had been a rollercoaster of the past few weeks.

"3...2....1," He counted and we all snorted it. It fucking hurt like a bitch. Imagine snorting pop rocks, that's what it feels like. And the post nasal drip is something else, man. It was disgusting. 

Seth got us all a waterbottle, from the fridge, except for Q's. Q hates cold drinks to the point where if something is still a little cold, he will put it in the microwave. Seth got his drink from the case of water on top of the fridge. It's good to stay super hydrated while you do psychedelics, because it is very easy to get dehydrated and pass out.

"Guys, make sure to stay hydrated tonight. We don't need any pass outs, like last time," Seth said and looked at Q, which we all laughed at. "And Ty and Adam, make sure you guys are quiet!" I went as red as nasty ass ketchup. I always blushed super bad, which was embarrassing, which was the reason I was blushing in the first place, so its a whole viscous cycle. 

"I uh, well, um...yeah," I said and looked at my hands and started fidgeting with my hands. Adam put his arm around my back. I wasn't super sure how he swung, but he didn't get all weird at Seth's comment, so he has to be at least bisexual. Or something. 

"So when is this gonna hit us?" Q asked, always impatient. Always.

"In time, Q, patience is a virtue, remember?" Jason told him. If I had a dollar for every time Q and Jason went back and forth over Q's impatience, I would be fucking rich. 

"Q, why does your hair look blonde in the sunlight?" Seth asked him.

"Because my hair is blonde?" 

"No way, what the fuck, is it really?" We all love Seth, despite him not being the brightest.

"Yes?"

"To be fair, Q, it's not like it's platinum bleach blonde or anything, it's pretty dirty blonde," I stepped in, playing devil's advocate. 

"Okay, fair, but it's still blonde!" 

"Yeah for sure, but it might not be crazy obvious for everyone," I looked over at Adam, who was quiet. "Why are you so quiet, Adam, are you okay?"

"Uh I'm just...chillin'" He said with a goofy ass smile. His eyes were super dilated. I could barely see the green in his eyes. 

"It's hitting you, isn't it?"

"Yeah maybe a little bit," He said and bit his lip slightly. I smiled at him.

"We got one! Is it hitting anyone else?" As soon as I said that, the yellow sunlight started to turn pink. "Woahhh, guys the sun turned pink, look!" The guys all looked out the window, and started to laugh.

"Okay looks like we got two. Ty, you're trippin'" Seth laughed.

"Literally," Q added. God, Q was my best friend in the entire world. I don't think I could love anyone as much as I did him, other than my mom. And Seth was amazing, too. He was so kind and would give you the shirt off his back, and then his pants, and his shoes and anything he could give you. And Jason, Jason gets having a fucked up life. He was always there as a rock when I couldn't talk to the other guys. 

"Nah, Ty I think you might be on to something, except you totally got the colour wrong. The sun's purple," Jason said.

"Alright let's give it up for three!" Q said.

"What are you, crazy? It's totally pink!" Jason just shook his head. He's got me fucked up if he thinks the sun is purple. I turned to look over at Adam. I don't know if this is his first time doing molly or something, but he looked like he was freaking out a little.

"Hey, you okay?" I asked. He was a really sweet guy, and I actually liked him a lot, despite feeling like I shouldn't. Man, sober me is gonna kill me for admitting that. 

"Yeah, I'm good. I just don't talk a lot when I'm high." That's fair actually. Before I used drugs a lot, I wouldn't talk much. 

Jason turned on his TV and started playing some Skyrim. An odd choice to play on molly, in my opinion, but whatever. Q and Seth decided to order a pizza. I swear those guys could eat a full course meal on cocaine, they have insanely big stomachs. I cautiously looked at Adam, but he made eye contact with me so I looked away really fast. He pushed a piece of hair behind my ear. I smiled and looked at my feet. I didn't know why I was being so coy, but I couldn't help it.

"Hey," he said softly. I looked up at him.

"Hey," I responded.

"Do you wanna go upstairs or something?" He said in almost a whisper.

"Yeah. C'mon," I smiled and took him upstairs to my room. We each had our own rooms here. The rest of the boys were so high and involved with their own shit I don't even think they noticed. 

"Hang on, I'll be right back," I told him and went downstairs into the bathroom. I felt good, but I wanted to be higher. I knew Jason had a bottle of Oxy somewhere in his medicine cabinet. I looked around in there for a minute and found some Adderall. Good, but not what I was looking for. I pulled it out and sat it on the sink anyway. I continued my search and finally found some Oxy. It was filed under the name Mark Danny, Jason's uncle. I decided to take both of them, what could be the worst thing to happen?

I popped 1 Adderall and 2 Oxys, and looked at myself in the mirror. I looked fucking disgusting, but when don't I? I shrugged and went back up to my room. 

"Hey," He said again. Damn is that the only thing that boy can say. He put his hands on my face and looked at me for a long time. I wondered what was going through his head. He looked so beautiful. I knew I was high, and molly makes you love everyone, but he really did have a pretty face.

I decided to break the silence and kiss him. I never used to be the one making the first moves, but with Adam I seem to be. He kissed back, which was a blessing considering I and the rest of the population thought he was straight up until this moment. His scruffy face was a little bit itchy, but it was a nice change. 

He started kissing harder, and I pulled off his shirt. He didn't reciprocate, thankfully. I'd rather not have him see all the cuts and bruises and open up a can of worms right now. I pushed him onto the bed and was straddling him. Almost as soon as I did that, I broke out into a sweat, which doesn't sound all that unusual, but I felt like absolute shit. I felt like someone was gripping my throat and I couldn't breath, I started seeing spots in my vision. 

"Ty, you okay?" I sat up and immediately felt like I was going to throw up, so I ran to the bathroom. I almost didn't make it, which would have been fucking awful. Adam ran into the bathroom behind me, putting his shirt on.

"What's wrong, Ty?" 

"I think I'm overdosing!" I told him, while also choking a little bit on my own puke. 

"Well you took the same amount of molly as the rest of us, and we're fine!" I swear this guy is beautiful but sometimes he really is irritating.

"No, when I went to the bathroom, I took Adderall and Oxycontin as well," I responded, somewhat shittily. I flushed the toilet and sat back on the wall. "I think I need to go to the hospital, because I feel like straight death,"

Adam came over and helped me up on my feet, and I nearly fell over once I stood up. He threw one of my arms over his shoulders and helped me down the stairs.

"Hey, Ty thinks he's overdosing and he says he needs to go to the hospital."

"Did he take anything other than the molly?" Q asked. Q knows me better than anyone, he should know that's a stupid question.

"Yeah, he took some Adderall and Oxycontin," The boys all got up and Jason grabbed his keys.

"We'll go in my car, c'mon," Adam continued to help me to Jason's car and he and Q sat with me in the back seat, and Jason and Seth sat in the front. I felt like dicks so I leaned my head on Adam's shoulder and closed my eyes, and before I knew it, I was out.


	6. Dammit

I woke up in a cold sweat in a hospital room. The last thing I remember was throwing up at Jason's house. Something bad must've happened.

"Hey Ty, you awake?" Seth asked me. He was sitting on the edge of my bed. Jason and Q weren't in the room. I rubbed my eyes and nodded. My stomach was killing me.

"What happened?" 

"I guess you took Oxy and Adderall before you went up to your room to have sex with Adam, and then you like overdosed,"

"No, Adam and I didn't have sex,"

"Oh I thought you did, I'm sorry,"

"No, no it's cool. Where is everyone?"

"They went to get us some food. They'll be back soon,"

"How long have I been out?" I ripped my arm over and winced when I realized that I had an IV in that arm. Fuck that hurt.

"Careful, careful. We got here like 3 hours ago, so about that long," Damn I didn't realize I had been out for that long. This was like the first time I had like, overdosed. I was always pretty good about handling my drugs.

The nurse walked in shortly after Seth said that and she gave me a sad smile. Seth stood up and the nurse took his place on the bed and placed her hand on my knee. 

"So Tyler,"

"He goes by Ty," Seth cut in. She smiled at him.

"Okay, Ty, you did have a minor overdose. We would have pumped your stomach, but your friends told me that you threw up before you got here, so you would have thrown up most of the drugs. We understand that your dad is in rehab, so we left a message for him there." I hated that they had to tell my dad. I don't want him to know, since he just went to rehab literally this morning.

I looked down at my hands and didn't say anything.

"We recommend that you go to a couple Narcotics Anonymous meetings. There's plenty of them here in Los Angeles,"

"I'm not an addict, though," I argued.

"Maybe not, but it wouldn't hurt to stop in, and get a good place of communication before you do become an addict," I nodded, knowing full well that I wasn't going to no fucking Narcotics Anonymous. That's for people who like sell their house for heroin and had their kids taken from them. I'm not an addict, I just took it a little too far this one time.

"Am I getting out any time soon?" I just wanted to go back to Q's house. I hate hospitals, they remind me too much of my mom. 

"We're gonna keep you here overnight to keep an eye on you, but you should be good to go tomorrow morning," She smiled again and looked at Seth, "You guys did the right thing, honestly. It might have been minor this time, but it's good to not be scared, in case it was serious." She got up to check my vitals, and Seth sat back down on the bed. Checking vitals was something I was used to. Every hour when my mom was in the hospital, someone would come in to check her vitals. I always hated when they would come in. 

"Ty, do you need anything, are you okay?" Seth asked. He was always trying to take care of us. He really was so sweet. 

"No thank you,"

We chatted for a little while before the rest of the guys came in with our food.

"Wassup, Ty, we got you your favourite, Del Taco!" Q yelled. Jason and Adam walked in behind him. I sat up and smiled. That was so sweet of them for bringing me food.

"Seth, we got you your Del Combo with some fries of course, and for you Ty, we got you some queso loaded nachos," Jason said while handing us our respective meals. Seth immediately started eating, since they never got to eat their pizza that they ordered and the rest of the boys sat down in the hospital chairs.

"Where's your guys' food?" I asked them. I didn't want to eat if they weren't eating.

"Oh we already ate, don't worry," I nodded. I grabbed a fork from the bag and started eating my nachos. Eating is not my favourite thing in the world. Like, I don't have an eating disorder or anything, but I don't hate that I usually don't eat. Del Taco was something I was always in the mood for, no matter what. That's where we always went to celebrate things. We'd smoke a blunt in the parking lot and then go in and eat.

"They said they're gonna keep him here overnight. And that he should probably go to an NA meeting," Seth informed the guys. 

"NA? But he's not an addict, right?" Adam said and started biting his nails. We haven't made eye contact since they got here. 

"No, he's not, so you're not going, are you?" Jason asked me. I shook my head.

"Yeah I'm not fucking going to that shit, she's got the game fucked up if she thinks I'm going," I laughed to lighten the mood up. I took another bite of my nachos. Man these shits were so fucking good. The queso was just slightly spicy, but it worked well. "Hey Adam, are you gonna be okay here overnight? Jason could probably drive you home if you need to be with your sisters."

"Oh no it's okay. I never get to do anything. I'm not their dad, he can take care of them until tomorrow." Every time he talks about his dad, he seems shitty. I don't really know what goes on in that house but he never seems to ever speak good about his dad.

"Okay. Hey what time is it?" I asked. 

"Its like 9:30," Q responded. Okay so it's late. Good, that means I can get out of here faster. I took the last bite of my nachos and put the fork and the container on the table next to me. I heard my phone ringing somewhere and Adam grabbed it out of his pocket and handed it to me. I thanked him and answered it.

"Hey, Tyler, its me," my dad said. I sighed. Great. "I got a message from the hospital. You overdosed?"

"I mean technically it was a minor overdose. But yeah,"

"I thought you said you weren't doing drugs anymore,"

"No, I told you I wasn't really doing Xanax anymore,"

"So what are you doing? What caused the OD?"

"Uh we took molly, and then I took some Adderall and some Oxy," I really didn't want to have this conversation with my dad. And definitely not now.

"Tyler, you really can't be doing that stuff. It'll mess your life up,"

"Yeah Dad, I really need a lecture from you right now. Hey by the way, aren't you in rehab right now? I don't think you have any leg to stand on to tell me what I should or shouldn't be doing,"

"I'm your father,"

"Yes, thank you for reminding me. You said that this morning. I know you are my father, but you lost all of my respect when you broke my ribs, and told me you didn't love me, and told me my mother wouldn't love me. So no, you don't get to say those things or do those things to me and then turn around and try to parent me. I have people who love me. Q's parents were there for me countless times. His mom was there for me to take me to the hospital when you broke my ribs. She was there to show me how to cover up the many bruises you left on me. They were there to feed me when you were too drunk to. You don't get to do this to me. Not now," I was so fucking mad at him. I wanted him to be there for me. I wanted him to be a shoulder to cry on when my mom died. I wanted him to be my dad. But he wasn't. He didn't get that privilege anymore. I started crying rubbed my eyes. 

"I know Tyler, I just don't wanna see you fuck up like I did,"

"Yeah well the difference is, I don't have a child to care for. If I'm fucking up, at least I'm only fucking myself up,"

"Those drugs will kill you. Opiates will kill you,"

"I hope they fucking do. That would make you happy, wouldn't it?"

"No, no not at all. I love you and I just wanna see you happy and healthy,"

"If that were true, you wouldn't have done everything in your power to do the opposite. Bye Dad. I'll see you in six months, give or take," I told him and hung up the phone. I dropped my head into my hands and sobbed. Fuck my dad and everything he put me through. Fuck the days where he was in a good mood and was nice to me. Fuck him for breaking my ribs, and fuck him for trying to get better and reconcile. 

Q came over and sat with me and gave me a hug. I leaned my head onto his chest and continued to cry. He was the only person in the world that knew me and understood me. Jason could relate with fucked up families, but Q knows everything about me. He ran his hands through my hair and cradled my head. 

"It's okay, Ty. He's gone. He'll be gone for six months and that gives my parents a better leg up to adopt you. We won't let him hurt you anymore, I promise," He soothed.

"I'm so scared. What if he starts drinking again when he comes back? I just said a bunch of shit to him he could get mad at me for that, and if he drinks again when he gets out I don't know what he would do,"

"No we won't let that happen, Ty. I promise. I will tell my mom as soon as I can and she'll call the judge immediately. We won't let him hurt you anymore," I nodded and sat up and he unwrapped his arms. I wiped my eyes and started to calm down.

"I'm sorry you had to see all of my daddy issues, Adam. It's just a weird time right now," I told him.

"No, its okay. I get it." I nodded. I was super fucking tired at this point, and my head was killing me. I slid over and laid down and crossed my arms over my eyes. Q laid down next to me and I fell asleep.

I woke up to Q's mom rushing into my room. Q and I sat up and rubbed the tired out of our eyes. I squinted from the sunlight. His mom came over and sat on the bed and took my hands in hers.

"Honey, what happened? Seth texted me and told me I should come up here," She looked so worried. 

"I um, I OD'd," I said and looked at my hands. "We should have told you sooner, I'm sorry,"

"It's okay, baby," She said and hugged me. "I'm just glad you're okay. What was it that you took?" Q and I looked at eachother.

"Well, we took molly, and then I took some Adderall and Oxycontin,"

"And then he threw up and told us that he needed to go to the hospital. So Jason drove us," Q added. His mom nodded and turned around to face Jason.

"Thank you Jason. It would have been nice if one of you called me, but as long as you guys are safe." She looked at Adam. "Hi, I'm Quentin and Ty's mom. Well, not biologically or legally Ty's mom, but family can be whatever you want it to be," She laughed and smiled. I loved her so much. 

"Hi, I'm Adam. I'm friends with Ty, and we were hanging out when this happened,"

"I'm sorry this is how we had to meet. Come over for dinner sometime, we'd love to have you. All of you. It's been a while since you all have been over," She looked back at me. "How long did they say you have to be in here?"

"Uh this morning I should be out. I should call the nurse and tell her that I'm awake," I said and pressed the "call nurse" button. It would probably be around a half an hour before she got in here. If you're not in the emergency room, it takes forever for anything to happen.

"Do you want me to drive you boys home?" His mom asked Q.

"Uh no, we'll probably go back to Jason's house."

"What, so you guys can finish your molly?" She asked and raised her eyebrows. She always did that when she was being jokingly stern.

"No, mom. We wait at least three months between our trips. And it's been a long time since we had done anything,"

"And who said I was okay with that?"

"We're being safe! This was the first time that anything has gone wrong, and it was because Ty just took too much this one time. And it was minor. They only kept him here overnight to monitor him." Q explained. Q was so good at knowing exactly what to say to his mom to get her to trust us. She always trusted us regardless.

"Okay," She loosened her bun a little bit. "I believe you. I'm gonna stay here until Ty gets discharged, though."

"Okay thank you," I told her. She smiled and ran her thumb over my cheek.

"Of course, baby,"

The nurse walked in and Q's mom stood up to shake her hand.

"Hello, I'm Ty's nurse, Kaitlyn. And you are?"

"His legal guardian. I'm Quentin's mom," she motioned towards Q. "And Ty's friends told me I should come up this morning. I understand that he will be discharged this morning?"

"Yeah as long as he's feeling better," She said and looked at me, as if she was asking me.

"Yeah I feel fine,"

"Great, we're just gonna check your vitals one last time," She said and grabbed the blood pressure pump from the wall behind me. "Oh and Ty's father is in rehab so he's not available to provide insurance. Is he, by chance, on yours as well?" She asked Q's mom. She grabbed her wallet from her purse to grab her insurance card.

"Yes he is. I give this to the woman at the front desk, correct?"

"Yes. Okay Ty, you are good to go. I will go grab your discharge papers. Sit tight, it should be no later than a half an hour." I nodded and thanked her. 

Q's mom had to leave to go pick up Q's sister from her play practice. She's always shown an interest in theatre since she was super little. I can't wait to see her on Broadway. Granted, if I live that long. She waved me a kiss before she left and I waved one back at her. 

"Anyone need coffee?" Jason asked.

"Yes please I'm dying for some," I responded. Seth and Q agreed.

"Okay Adam and I will go grab some. Ty, black? Seth 3 and 3? and Q 3 cream no sugar?" He knew our orders perfectly. They headed down to the cafeteria and I got up to find my clothes. I fucking hate hospital gowns. Q, almost reading my mind, let me know that they were in the bathroom. I grabbed my phone off the side table and headed into the bathroom adjacent to the door. I desperately needed a shower so I turned the hot water on. There was like no water pressure to the water. It makes sense, with the drought going on in California and whatever. I untied the gown from the back and threw it into the sink and stepped in the shower, which was also not as hot as I liked it. I ran my hair through the water and let it run down my body. Those fairly fresh cuts on my stomach stung from the hot water, but I didn't hate it. There was some travel sized 3 in 1 on a ledge in the shower. I lathered some of it in my hair and then used the rest of it on my body.

After my shower, I did a sniff test on my clothes and nearly gagged. They smelled like I took a bath in puke. But it was my only option. I think I had some more clothes at Jason's. I looked at my reflection in the mirror. I looked sick. My eye bags were more prominent than usual, my hair was ratty. It naturally covered one of my eyes, and was about shoulder length. My mom always tried to keep my hair long. She thought it made me look like Kurt Cobain. I ran my fingers through my hair to comb it out so it looked less like shit and walked back into my room. Jason and Adam walked in with our coffees as I walked out of the bathroom. Adam handed me mine and then gave Seth's his. I thanked him and gave him a hug and sat down on the bed. Jason gave Q his coffee and he and Adam sat back down in the chairs. 

"What do you guys want to do when we get back home?" Jason asked.

"Wanna play Egyptian Ratscrew?" Seth offered. Jason looked around at all of us and we all agreed. Egyptian Ratscrew is our favourite card game. It's more commonly referred to as Slapjack, and I don't know why we don't just call it that. 

"What's Egyptian Ratscrew?" Adam asked.

"Ever play Slapjack?" Q asked him.

"Yeah I'm a fucking master at that game,"

"It's the same game. I don't know we're all pretty good at that game. We might just show you up," Seth responded. 

The nurse walked back in with my papers and handed them to me. 

"Okay, you're good to go, Ty. Your guardian took care of the insurance downstairs. Who is your ride?"

"Oh um my friend Jason," I said and turned and looked at him. He smiled and waved at her. 

"Okay, great. Have a safe trip home, and please, stay away from drugs. You're 17. They will seriously mess you up. It's easier to stop now, when there is little damage, than when you're too far gone." I curled my lip and nodded. I can't wait to just go back to Jason's and not be surrounded with people who think I'm an addict when I'm not one. I stood up and found my shoes right by the bathroom door. I slipped them on and Jason pulled his keys out of his pocket and we started walking back to the elevator. This was by far the biggest hospital in Los Angeles. We were on the 5th floor so the elevator ride was a bit long. We passed by the front desk ladies and one woman who looked around 21 waved at me.

"I hope you feel better soon," She said. I smiled at her and looked away. I've literally never seen her before I don't know why she's telling me to "feel better". We continued our walk towards Jason's car and I sipped my coffee. Black coffee was the best. Creamer watered it down and it just ruined the actual content of the coffee. We all piled into his Audi A3. Jason and Seth in the front seat and the rest of us in the back. Although we're all extremely close and basically a family, we have our best friends. Q is of course my best friend, and Jason and Seth are best friends. They were friends their whole lives. Q became friends with them in middle school. We would all do anything for any one of us, though. I just happen to be the one with the most problems. There was a time, however, that someone told Seth's parents that he was gay and we all had to band together and pretend Q's girlfriend at the time was Seth's girlfriend so they would get off his back. That was a rough time.

We pulled into Jason's house and Adam's phone went off.

"Fuck, I gotta get home, Ty. I'm sorry," He told me.

"Oh. Okay I'll uh see you soon then. Is it your dad?"

"Yeah he's pretty pissed at me for not coming home last night."

"Wait I thought you said it was okay? Jason could have driven you home last night." I wouldn't have had him stay with us if his dad was going to get mad at him. 

"No it's fine. I knew he would be mad but like I said I never get to do anything. I always have to be home for my sisters. And I love my sisters, don't get me wrong, but I'm 17. I shouldn't have to raise 3 kids. I need to live my life too," He said and grabbed my hands and kissed them. "I'll see you soon," I gave him a sad smile and got out of the car. The guys and I walked to Jason's door and I turned around to wave goodbye to Adam and he waved back. We all walked in to Jason's house and sat down in the living room.

"I need a fucking blunt," I groaned.

"God, me too," Seth agreed. "I have like $20 I can throw in."

"Oh, no you're good this is still the weed we all threw down for," Jason told him. I was so happy to be out of the hospital and back into a familiar place. Other than Q's, Jason's place was where I spent most of my time. We almost always are at Jason's just because there's no parents around. Q's mom probably wouldn't care if we smoked or drank at her house, but we feel it's a little bit disrespectful, and there's no way we can do anything at Seth's house. We were all invited to his house for dinner one time like a year and a half ago, and it was a fucking wild ride.  
~  
I got out of Q's car and looked at him.

"I think I should go back. I can't do it like this. I'm freaking out dude," I was sweating bullets and my heart was racing and I couldn't think straight. I did way way too much coke. Holy shit. Q walked over to me and put his hands on my shoulders.

"Ty, look at me. You are fine. All we're doing is eating dinner. I know it's hard to eat but just fake it 'til you make it, okay?" He soothed. I nodded and wiped my hands on my jeans. We walked up to the door and knocked. Seth greeted us and looked at me weird and I gave him a nervous smile.

"Q, the living room is that way," He said and pointed to the left. "Ty, can I talk to you?" He pulled me aside.

"What's up?" I asked him, trying to act as normal as possible.

"Ty what the fuck are you on?" He whispered.

"C-cocaine?" I stuttered.

"Are you fucking kidding me? You know how important this is to me, Ty!" While he was whispering, he was like yell-whispering. It just made me more nervous.

"I only planned on taking a little just so I was charismatic but then I just took to much, I'm sorry!"

"Ty you always take too much! That's why we told you you need to stop doing cocaine! You know what, it's fine. Just be as normal as you can." I nodded and we walked into the living room to see Q and Jason and Seth's parents.

"Hi Mr. and Mrs. Bailey, I'm Ty," I said and held out my shaky hand to shake theirs'. They kindly shook mine.

"Wow Seth I didn't know you had so many white friends," His mother said.

"Mom, please. They're my friends."

"I know honey, I just thought in such a big city, you might have at least one other black friend," Seth was embarrassed, but I get it.

I walked back over to the couch Jason and Q were sitting on and sat down next to Q.

"So, Ty. What's your home life like?" His dad asked. While I don't know them that well, they are my best friend's parents so I figured I should be honest with them.

"I don't really have one. I stay with Q most of the time. My um, my mom died when I was 14 and I don't really get along with my dad so that's why I stay with Q," Mrs. Bailey put her hand over her heart and gave me a sympathetic look.

"I'm so sorry about your mom. How come you don't get along with your dad?"

"Mom-" Seth tried.

"No, it's okay. Uh my dad's a drinker and he likes to take his grief and anger out on me so," I said and looked at my hands. 

"Son, that's awful. I'm sorry," Mr. Bailey said. "Q, I understand you have been friends with Seth and Jason for some time. How come we have never met you?"

"Yes we've been friends since like middle school. I actually don't know how we've never met. I guess I've never been invited," He laughed. The reason he's never met Seth's parents was because Seth didn't want them to meet. He thought his parents would disapprove of their friendship for some reason, so they kept them apart from each other. It's kinda funny since Jason is a literal drug dealer, but they love him. They obviously don't know about the drugs, though.

"Well, I'm glad we're meeting now. What's your home life like?" His mother asked.

"Well my mom is a journalist. She writes stories about what's going on in downtown LA, and focuses on West Hollywood. And my dad is a traveling CEO. He's based in LA, so he goes around to different businesses and works alongside their CEO's for however long they need him, and if one of them is sick, he steps in for them. He usually doesn't have to travel, but he's been flown out to New York and Chicago before. I have a little sister who's 9 and while Ty loves her, I think she's annoying personally."

"Oh Seth knows all about that. Luckily Aaron is at practice right now, or else Seth would be strangling him." Aaron is Seth's little brother. He goes to school with Arabelle. I've only seen him a couple times, but he's a sweet kid.

I was seriously hoping they would let us eat soon, since I wanted this to be over. I didn't mind his parents, but I was so fucking jittery. My leg was bouncing so bad and I just wanted to leave.

"Seth, why don't you help your dad set the table, while I get the rest of the food set up?" His mom asked. Thank fuck. Seth and his dad left to go to the dining room, and she to the kitchen. I leaned back on the couch and put my hands over my eyes, trying to calm down a little bit.

"Okay what the fuck is wrong with you, Ty?" Jason whisper-yelled. I looked at him and he looked pretty angry.

"I um, I did too much coke," And I gave him a sheepish smile.

"Are you fucking kidding me? Why would you do any at all?"

"I just wanted to be less nervous but it kinda backfired. I'm sorry," Jason shook his head and walked into the dining room and Q followed him. I sighed and decided to go in there as well. Seth and his dad were just finishing setting the table when I got into the dining room. It was a really nice room. Super long dining table, and beautiful wooden chairs. The room was like a deep maroon colour, and on the farthest wall was a giant china cabinet full of probably expensive china. Jason and Q sat down next to each other and Q pointed to the chair next to him, for me to sit. I complied. I knew he was mad at me, but it was the best thing for me to listen to him, that way I don't get Seth in trouble. 

Seth and his dad sat down, and his mom came in with all of the dishes. Mashed potatoes and gravy, mac and cheese, and chicken. Easy food to eat, thank god.

"Lets say grace," His mother said and we all grabbed each other's hand. God I hate praying.

"Dear heavenly father, thank you for this day, and thank you for blessing us with this food and the ability to have Seth's friends over to eat with us. Thank you for giving Q's parents beautiful hearts and for having them take in Ty as their own. Please Lord, find your way into his father's heart and allow him to see the error in his ways of how he is treating his son. Once again, Lord, thank you for this day and for all you have blessed us with. In the Lord's name I pray, Amen," Mr. Bailey prayed and we all repeated "amen". 

Everyone started filling their plates with as much as they could, whereas I filled mine with as little as possible. I had a negative appetite, honestly and the last thing I wanted to do was eat a bunch of soul food. 

"Ty, you can grab more food honey." His mom said. I smiled at her.

"Oh thank you, but I'm not really hungry," She nodded. Thank god.

We shared laughter and everyone inhaled their food, but I was pretty much picking at mine, taking a few bites here and there. Seth's parents seemed to love Q, which isn't surprising, he's a lovable person. I talked when I had to, but tried to talk as little as possible. They shared stories of dumb things Seth and Jason did when they were little, and Q shared a couple stories of dumb shit I've done. Mr. Bailey kept looking at me quizzically all through the meal.

"Son, are you okay? You've barely eaten and you are extremely jittery. What's going on?" He finally asked. Everyone turned their heads to me. It felt like the world turned dark and there was a spotlight on me and everyone was watching me, waiting for me to fuck up like I always did. Why were they looking at me? Was it that obvious? Is it my eyes? Why did they all look so mad at me?

"Yeah I'm fine," I said with a smile. His dad kept looking at me for what seemed like forever. But eventually he dropped it and continued eating. Seth calmed down, poor kid was probably holding every bit of breath he had. 

Other than that, the night went great and Seth's parents invited us over again for the next week, and I was sure that I wouldn't fuck it up by doing to much coke. God that was such a dumb fucking mistake.  
~


End file.
